leaves unfurl

Got up this morning to go to the Farmer's Market and found this note on the fridge:

"To: Everyone

1. Clean as you go

2. Keep [k]nitting in room unless it is being used

3. Keep items in room unless using them

4. Keep all but one or 2 pairs of shoes in room"

This note was from the other roommate (that is, not daimeera or limetreebower ), and really pissed me off. Until today, she had done literally nothing around the apartment (she moved in Sunday) - we did her dishes - and she didn't say anything to any of us about any of this. Personally (daimeera and limetreebower , you guys have already heard this, haha) I found this approach very passive-aggressive. Plus the tone of this note implies that, well, the common area can't be common - that is, it seems like I can't even leave a book of the fucking coffee table if I'm not right there.

It isn't even entirely what she said that's pissing me off, it's more how she said it - leaving this note, written in the imperative voice, as if these are The Rules and That's All There Is To It. I have to admit, though, the fact that she went through the stuff on the coffee table and moved it all to the edge of the living room (throwing out daimeera's afghan pattern and nearly making me have to tear out 200 stitches from one of my knitting projects in the process) also irritates me.

Today, she washed dishes (ignoring what I had told her about my cast iron pan, and putting it away with water in it), emptied the garbage and recycling (while putting recyclables in the garbage, recyclables that we can get MONEY for in the normal recycling, and subsequently leaving it in the hallway outside our apartment), and piled the things from the top of the coffee table in a milk crate on the edge of the living room, including my afghan, which I brought for the living room.

So, yes, she has finally done something other than make the mess, but at the same time, I am really ticked by her passive-aggressive behaviour. Like, she seems to want everything to be totally spotless and, well, this isn't JUST her apartment. I should be able to leave a scarf I'm knitting on the coffee table, or a book, or whatever - it's the living room, it's a common area. We should be able to LIVE in it, hence the name "living room". And her "clean as you go" is irritating me because, well, I do DO dishes every day. I don't think that doing the dishes in the evening or whatever is unreasonable - it takes less time to do them all at once, less water, and is less tiring (particularly for one of my other roommates, who has CFS). The other night I left some stuff in the sink because it was after midnight and I had just got home from work and was tired and wanted to go to bed. It isn't like anything has been left long enough to go mouldy or something - I don't think anything has been left for 24 hours even.

It just feels like it'll start with this and then, y'know, grow to "no TV after X" or "no cooking before Y" or "no friends over between Z and A" or something. And if it gets to that, well, I'll probably stop being reasonable and give her a big ol' FUCK YOU, particularly since she has, so far, put on music loud enough that we had to jack up the TV volume super high, and on another occasion I could hear it over my music in my room with my door shut.

Neither I nor anyone else has talked to her yet because 1) she went home for the weekend this morning (which makes it seem even more passive-aggressive to me) and 2) I wanted to find out if I was the only one irritated.

I wouldn't call getting irritated over a passive-aggressive postit from someone that has no place to speak is unreasonable at all. I say you should call an apartment meeting, and have everyone agree on some house rules, instead of letting her lord over you and your possessions.

Somewhat on the other hand, make sure she understands the kind of damage she might do by disturbing projects-- I've had people not understand that rubbing their hands all over an unsealed charcoal drawing would smudge it until I explained it, sort of thing. I know nothing about knitting, but I get the feeling that she wasn't being purposefully destructive-- just unaware of the damage she should do. <3

We're going to talk to her on eithe rSunday evening or Monday, whenever we see her next (she's gone for the weekend). I for one wasn't up for it this morning on three hours of sleep. XDD

I know she probably didn't know that she could screw something up, but the fact remains that she didn't just move stuff, but went through it enough to decide that daimeera's pattern was garbage, and showed no respect at all for our property, in that she just shoved it all together in the crate by the wall.

...the post-it note is what gets me the most. Having guidelines is one thing, but not having the (time/guts/whatever) to talk them out with people you're sharing space with is downright immature. Maybe it's her first housemate experience?

Even if so, I'd feel how you did. Sit down and talk it out; in any case, good luck. ♥

Yeah, she really should have. And leaving the note was even more passive-aggressive than it normally would have been, what with her promptly leaving for the rest of the weekend. :/

That's mostly how I feel - nothing is getting scummy or mouldy or anything. Not even close. So why is doing the dishes once a day instead of three times such a big deal? They're still getting done every day. Ugh.

This may have been something that has been bothering her for the whole time since she's moved in- that doesn't excuse her behaviour, but letting something fester like that... it's easy for it to bubble over into WELL IF THEY WON'T CLEAN UP I WILL, GOSH!

Talking to her may help somewhat, but it's likely that someone who is so concerned about keeping the space tidy will be too anal to accept that they could have been overstepping their own role in the housemate situation.

If you're lucky, your team of LEAVE-KNITTING-AROUND might intimidate her into staying in her room all the time?

*flail*I kneew there was something fishy about that one! And such bad taste in music!!!!AND WTF?! Rules??? No "Nitting?" in the living room...helllloo LIVE! KNIT TO LIVE!!! And it wasn't even that messy - I thought it was cozy... and she doesn't do dishes... she doesn't even eat?FLAIL!!!